Blast from the Past Review: Daredevil TPB Book one

I recently downloaded the collected trade of the first few issues of Generation X. I remember thinking it was great when I was a kid, but was fully aware that it had probably aged as poorly as most of Marvels X output of the time. I should have listened to my gut. It was terrible. I wouldn’t go so far as to say it ruined my childhood, like every DC movie announcement seems to be doing to the more unhinged corners of Internet fans. But it did leave a nasty, foil-embossed taste in my mouth. It was now worryingly possible that my pubescent, younger self may not have had the impeccable taste that I had attributed to him. It was now wholly probable that I was a spotty idiot.

So it was with some trepidation that I downloaded the first collected edition of BMB and co’s acclaimed run on Daredevil, which began in the early 2000’s. I had just finished the new TV series and was left craving more fearless blind guy shenanigans. And although it was unlikely comics would deliver the double roundhouse kick-filled joy that Netflix had given me, I remembered telling anyone who would listen back in the day that the comic was incredible. So I dove in. I wish I hadn’t.

Not because it’s terrible, you understand. Because it’s so unashamedly brilliant, and that meant buying the next two collected editions with money that my girlfriend had earmarked for savings or some such rubbish.

Before reviewing this incredible book, it is important that we address the decompressed elephant in the room. Critics of Bendis have long shaken their collective fists at his unmistakable story telling fingerprint. Why say something in one word balloon, when you can have two characters talk about it in 28 word balloons over six pages? To them I say ‘because that’s life’. Life is decompressed. You can try all you like to streamline and condense like you would pack a holiday suitcase. But, just like your suitcase, all it needs is a little jolt and your life speedos will shoot out the minute you open it. Bendis writes conversations like people talk conversations, and superheroes are still people. It’s their people problems that make them interesting. And for the most part its normal unpowered people that are Daredevil’s foil in this first book.

Anyone picking up this book expecting to see Daredevil judo-battling with Bullseye in double splash pages, replete with sound effect balloons, are going to be very disappointed. The first story revolves around a mentally troubled young boy, scarred by an incident that has something to do with Daredevil. The real protagonist of the tale is long time Daredevil confidant Ben Urich, who has decided to investigate the child instead of covering the trial of the Kingpin, much to the consternation of J Jonah Jameson. There are no fight scenes, no villain. It is simply a tale of the inevitable, collateral damage that leaping around the city dressed in a devil costume and punching villains is bound to have.

In the first four issues, Bendis expertly weaves a tale involving the people who are normally satellites in our hero’s world. In anyone else’s comic, they are the people yelling, “Watch out behind you” or “look up in the sky”.

In Bendis’ world however, these moons have substance. They shout ‘behind you’ and the hero wins. But these people then have to deal with the emotional aftermath of the last ditch rescue. They have to hear the bones breaking and see the blood spattering but they can’t take to the rooftops to work out the stress on Leapfrog’s face. What happens to them in the aftermath of the hero can’t be punched or kicked. It’s real and unsettling.

This opening arc is penciled by the wonderful David Mack. He uses a number of visual styles to suit the situation, whether it’s the classic comic book cartoon style when the young boy is telling his Daredevil story, or the painted, dirty panels following Ben’s investigation. In anyone else’s hands this device would be jarring. In Mack’s, it’s genius. You feel the frustration of the boy in every crayon depiction of the night that caused his catatonia. You desperately try to understand what is happening in these panels. But you can’t. It’s there, it is within reach, but you just can’t access it. Exactly what the boy is feeling. It is a master-class in visual storytelling.

This four-issue story serves a great introduction to the world that Bendis wants us to see. The real world that just happens to have a costumed vigilante in it. After that initial arc, it would be six more issues before he took the ropes full time. But it is a stunning marker. A sign of things to come.

The second arc, the main bulk of the book, addresses an elephant so large, I’m surprised it took that long to happen. That being the fact that Wilson Fisk, aka the Kingpin of crime, knows Matt Murdock is Daredevil.

When a young upstart mobster joins Fisk’s organization and learns this fact from Fisk’s disgruntled son, his incredulity is limitless. As it should be. Bendis lets the mobster speak for us, his disbelief is palpable, and we feel it too. How could you NOT use this knowledge to your advantage? This man, Silke, unfamiliar with Fisk’s fear-powered stranglehold over his operation makes the only logical leap when faced with the notion that almost all Fisk’s people know Matt Murdock is Daredevil, but are forbidden from acting on it. He decides Fisk isn’t fit to lead the gang, and plots a coup.

The coup lasts all of five minutes, but the repercussions of it are the real story. Matt is revealed to the world as Daredevil.

Again, this story doesn’t involve much action. There are no super villains in this story (unless you count the tabloid press I suppose). Instead, Matt finds himself in a situation he can’t pummel into submission. When some of his old foes inevitably show up at the offices of Nelson and Murdock to confront Matt, he dispatches them, not with double roundhouse kicks, but in decidedly lawyer-like fashion. It’s a humorous turn that serves to give us a break from the upsetting sight of Matt’s life disintegrating around him.

Sure, Elektra and Black widow show up, but it is his interactions with his human supporting cast, Foggy, Ben et al, that really shine here. In a beautiful role reversal, Foggy senses that it might just be his turn to save Matt. His arguments for abandoning the vigilante lifestyle are compelling and emotionally written. At times you find yourself agreeing with him. That you wish Matt would abandon being a superhero in a book built on his super heroics is as high a praise for the writing as I can give.

And what of the art? Alex Maleev’s Daredevil is dark and brooding, as his situation dictates. He inhabits a scratched, imperfect night, where everyone and everything that surrounds Daredevil seem to bear the scars of Hell’s Kitchen’s relentless assault. He is, to my mind, the definitive Daredevil artist. Nobody before, or since, has conveyed the horrific beauty of the city Daredevil inhabits, and the people that it devours.

This collected edition acts as a springboard for Bendis’ lengthy run. As a stand-alone, it is emotionally gripping, defying its decompression to flow seamlessly from page to page. It is word balloon-heavy, but you it compels you on with such ferocity that you won’t even notice the time passing. And it will leave you wanting more. I can guarantee you will NEED to see how this ends.

Re-discovering this trade has restored my confidence in my younger self’s taste in comics. I must have been doing something right 14 years ago if I picked this up, with no TV show prodding me to do so at the time. If the TV show manages nothing else but to convince a new generation of readers to pick up this trade, it will be a fine legacy. Let’s just pray that Marvel don’t commission a critically acclaimed X-Man show. Rediscovering those books won’t end well for anyone.

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RAID 2018 is a gaming event, by gamers, for gamers. Offering BYOC LAN tournaments, video game concerts, talks from industry professionals and much more, we're banking on this being the best

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RAID 2018 is a gaming event, by gamers, for gamers. Offering BYOC LAN tournaments, video game concerts, talks from industry professionals and much more, we’re banking on this being the best gaming event in Ireland during 2018!